1. Field of the Invention
The present invention relates generally to the field of grinding or related operations utilized in the surface conditioning of workpieces. In a more particular sense, the invention relates to devices for automatically positioning grinding wheels relative to workpieces passed in successively following order into engagement with the grinding wheel. Even more particularly, the present invention automatically positions the grinding wheel in respect to an underlying platen, in an arrangement wherein there is an automatic take-up for wear of the periphery of the grinding wheel, to maintain the pass-through space between the grinding wheel and platen at a predetermined, constant value.
2. Description of the Prior Art
Heretofore, so far as is known it has not been proposed to provide a device that will automatically take up for wear of a grinding wheel periphery, in such a way as to cause the wheel arbor to automatically gravitate to the exact extent necessary for maintaining the work-engaging periphery of the wheel at a constant, predetermined distance from a platen or bed along which workpieces are being fed in successively following order.
A problem arises in, for example, grinding wheel operations needed for grinding down the surface of a workpiece an exact, predetermined amount. In such cases, it is common practice to feed the workpiece between the periphery of the grinding wheel and an underlying bed or platen. As successively following workpieces are ground down, there is an accompanying wearing down of the periphery of the wheel. As a result, the distance between the periphery of the wheel and the flat bed or platen along which the workpieces are being fed tends to increase. This requires constant readjustment of the wheel arbor toward the bed, to take up for the reduction in the wheel diameter resulting from the constant wearing of the periphery thereof.
Automatic repositioning of the wheel, to take up for wear, is of course highly desirable and the present invention has as its broad purpose the provision of means for automatic, continuous, relocation of the wheel arbor, so that without the attention of a worker, there is at all times, a constant, unvarying pass-through space between the wheel periphery and the work-supporting platen.